Lego Legacy Legislation: What Is It, and How Can it Solve Our Problems? Gun Control Edition, the Complete Four-Part Series.

Updated to include new gun laws and related SCOTUS rulings from June 2022.

Part One: Regulation of Militia

In 2019, I wrote a piece for BLUNTMoms entitled, Insuring a Gun Solution. I proposed that, if each gun had to be insured to be operated, it would cut down on gun violence dramatically, while still protecting the second amendment. This year, some of the suggestions I proposed were used in San Jose, California legislation to do just that; and now, the entire states of both California and New York are considering similar laws. This is an example of what I call Lego Legacy Legislation.

If we wait to act until we have the ideal solution that solves all aspects of every problem, we can become paralyzed by inaction. If, however, we break big issues into small Lego pieces and snap two together at a time, we end up building a solution.

I know what it’s like to feel overwhelmed by life. Some days I can’t get out of bed, let alone accomplish what I intend to do for the day. The more I focus on the complete list of demands, the more daunting I find each task; but if I just complete two items and snap them together one by one, at the end of my day I have something that resembles a finished product. Anyone who has ever built a Lego masterpiece knows that it can be complicated and take time to see the shape we intend but that snapping each Lego together is relatively simple (as long as we don’t step on them barefoot). If we each could take this approach to gun control, just snap two Legos together at a time, imagine what we might be able to accomplish.

Big Problems Often Require Many Small Solutions

On May 24, 2022, a teenager walked into an elementary school in Uvalde Texas, and killed 19 children and two adults. On the day the shooter turned 18, there was a provocative ad on social media about the very gun he would go on to purchase and use. One Lego action might be to change laws around gun ads, a second around closing gun show loops, a third around background checks, and a fourth requiring guns to be insured. Each solution may only fix the problem by 25%, but four solutions each at a 25% efficacy can equal a 100% resolution.

We know gun laws work, because when they are repealed, gun violence rises. In the documentary, 91%: A Film About Guns in America, we revisit when Missouri had a permit to purchase, a PTP law, which required a permit to purchase all handgun transfers and background checks for all permits. When the PTP law was repealed in 2007, firearm homicide rose 25%—with no significant increase in surrounding areas. Around that same time, Connecticut passed a PTP law; and firearm homicide dropped around 40%. This may be a case where correlation is actually … causation.

A piece entitled “Reducing Gun Violence in America” reported that, during the Brady Act from 1994-2009, 1,925,000 gun sales were decided through background checks. 90% of denials were from prior criminal activity. Nearly 80% of guns used in violent crimes are purchased through a private seller with no background check or paper trail. In 1934, the National Firearms Act was created, mandating the taxation of manufactures, importers, and dealers in certain firearms and machine guns. In 1968, the Gun Control Act prohibited interstate firearms transfers, except among licensed manufacturers, dealers, and importers. How will we know when we have enough gun safety laws? When we stop having mass shootings, like other countries in the world who have figured this out.

The New Gun Laws

On June 27, 2022, President Joe Biden signed into law, the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act. It was the first significant, federal gun safety legislation in decades: imperfect, like most things in life, but it still contained three significant Lego legacy legislations more than we had before. The law provides:

o   Background checks for those under the age of 21

o   Closes the “boyfriend loop” for five years after a misdemeanor or felony, and

o   Provides funds for mental health services, funds to implement red flag laws, and funds for community-based violence prevention initiatives.

Unfortunately, on the very day this gun safety bill became law, so too the Supreme Court struck down a law that placed restrictions of carrying a concealed handgun in New York, a law that had been in place for more than 100 years. This accompanied the devastating blow SCOTUS delivered just three days prior on June 24, 2022, when they overturned Roe V Wade, which had protected women for nearly 50 years by keeping abortion safe and legal.

According to a Quinnipiac university poll, 91% of Americans support universal background checks. The majority of both Democrats and Republicans believe in legal abortion with restrictions. If majority doesn’t rule, how can we call ourselves a democracy? When guns are more protected than the rights of women, what does that say about our empirical values of women and children?

How Do You Save the Children When it’s Children Who Are Killing Other Children?

When kids are taught drills in school to prepare for and fear mass shooters, it brings a whole new meaning to the phrase“gun-shy.”

The New York Post reported that the Uvalde gunman, who I refuse to memorialize by putting his name in print, was able to legally purchase two assault rifles: one on his 18th birthday, and another on the following day, with no problem whatsoever as he had no criminal record or history of mental illness; and if he had, it would have been juvenile and expunged from his record once he turned 18. In other words, a background check might not have prevented this particular incident. The intent is that the new gun laws will; but proof of insurance, almost certainly would have.

If we required insurance approval prior to the purchase of firearms, this might have been avoided. In order to get life insurance, we often have to undergo a medical examination. I’ve even known insurance companies to peruse the social media accounts of the people they plan to insure and use psychological profiling to estimate the risk of insuring certain individuals. If gun insurance companies had the same requirements, what might they have found out about this young man? If an insurance company had to be responsible for every life taken by the bullet of a gun, I imagine it would be harder to get a gun, while still providing responsible people the legal right to own guns.

We allow people to join the military at the age of 18, where they have access to guns, but not without a thorough background check. If we can’t get the law to regulate background checks for the purchase of any gun, maybe we can get them to enforce gun insurance, knowing that those who are liable will, in fact, regulate.

The United States Constitution defines the 1791 second amendment as: “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.” To those willing to stand in the pools of children’s blood to protect the second amendment, I ask, “Where is the regulation in your Militia?”

Part Two: What Will It Take to End Mass Shootings?

Seeing one horrific death of a child after another from mass shootings doesn’t appear to be enough to stop mass shootings; but the more we focus on preserving the freedom of the gun owner while protecting the rights of those who might be harmed by guns, the more likely we will be able to prevent gun violence. “What?!” you might be saying, “Why should we care about preserving the rights of gun owners?” It’s because each time there’s a governmental threat to ban guns, the sale of guns goes up and mass shootings still occur.

We all need to think with our teacher/parent minds here—what’s the first thing a defiant person does when you tell them they can’t do something? They prove you wrong by doing it. What happens instead when you offer the freedom of choice, teach risk/benefit assessment, and point out natural consequences? People make better choices, don’t feel controlled, and are more likely to step into the responsibility of freedom with pride and conscience. We all need to get out of the habit of telling people what to think, and into the habit of teaching how to think. Human beings are driven by reactance to survive—taking people’s freedoms away does not work. If we want to stop driving the momentum of more gun violence, we have to stop perpetuating the threat of laws that take freedom away and use language that supports freedom of the gun owner in the name of protection for each and every one of us.

What is Freedom?

As I’ve written before and will write again, freedom is the state of being free: the right to act, speak, or think as one wants without hindrance or restraint (within laws that govern and protect inarguable harm to others). That’s where we get stuck, the “inarguable” part.  Now, let’s briefly look at freedom from both abortion and vaccine debates. In each case, one side is arguing that the other side is causing harm. Both of those issues are arguable from either side as to what may constitute as harm, who is harmed by the actions of another, and what the very definition of “harm” is in each case. However, when it comes to guns there is no such debate. Both sides can agree, for the very intent and purpose of a gun is to harm. A gun is not a decorative knickknack, it’s a weapon intended to kill. Even if under the guise of protection, it’s protection by way of harm. A gun is a firearm that was created to cause harm, and to protect people from harm, by threatening harm to those who threaten to harm—or of course, to kill animals for food or sport. There is no other purpose for guns. That is their one and only function: harm. So, when an 18-year-old wants to use their freedom to buy a semi-automatic rifle, it’s a simple and reasonable question for the person who is selling it to use their freedom to ask, “Why?”

John Cassidy reported in The New Yorker that in Israel, a pro-gun country, one needs to be over the age of 27, if they haven’t served in the military, before they can even apply to own a gun. Then they must have notification from their personal physician that they are mentally stable and pass a gun safety test before they are issued a government license permitting them to own a gun, and not every applicant is approved. If we know and all agree that the primary purpose of a gun is to harm, which could put each and every one of us at risk, it should not be an easy thing to purchase. It’s not taking any one person’s freedom away to require a process to buy a gun which could protect the personal freedoms of many others.

We’ve Been Here Before and Succeeded

We can look back at how the tobacco industry was systematically altered by a series of seemingly small acts that led to significant changes as a guide on how to protect the second amendment while also preventing mass shootings. When the FDA required tobacco companies to print the surgeon general’s warning that cigarettes cause cancer, directly on each package of cigarettes, it was not enough to get people to quit smoking; but shutting down public places where people could smoke was. It used to be legal on TV to advertise cigarettes directed at children in cartoons; now it’s not. Restaurants, airplanes, buses, and trains used to have “smoking and non-smoking sections;” now they don’t. Tobacco companies used to be able to sell cigarettes to minors; now they are prohibited from selling to anyone under the age of 21. One “Lego law” at a time can change the gun ownership landscape, and everyday citizens have the power to make this happen. People who want to smoke still have that freedom, they just no longer have the freedom to impose the risks of smoking onto others.

Ok, I’m Listening. Tell Me More. Empower Me to Create Change.

New laws start with a lobbyist who writes new legislation for an elected official to introduce. In the March 26, 2019, Vice episode entitled, “This is how to hire your own D.C. Lobbyist,” we meet the founder of “Lobbyist 4 Good” Billy DeLancy, who explains that it is “a crowdfunding platform that lets everyday people hire a lobbyist to get their voice heard and make actual change on Capitol Hill.” $5,000 will get you a part time lobbyist for one month and up to 35 meetings with congress and staff to take your issue to Capitol Hill to get new gun safety legislation written.

In the aftermath of the Uvalde shooting, I watched an impassioned video clip of Steve Kerr. He slammed his hands on the table and yelled, “When are we going to do something?!” I was moved to tears and grateful that he called out the senators who could make a difference. I saw the emotional and compelling Jimmy Kimmel response too. Steve is the NBA basketball coach of the Golden State Warriors. Jimmy a talk show host with access to nearly any celebrity. Both of these powerful men, and the wealthy athletes on each team, and every celebrity who tweets out “thoughts and prayers,” collectively have enough money to hire all the lobbyists needed to get insurance gun laws in every city, in every state in America. We can all do something about this today. We know what needs to get done, and we know how to do it. The next step is taking that action.

But We’re Told that Gun Laws Don’t Work

Critics of gun insurance proposals have claimed that criminals will simply disregard the law. I concur, for that’s usually what criminals do. The question we want to ask ourselves is—are mass shooters generally criminals? The one who just killed 19 children wasn’t a criminal. In fact, most mass shooters are typically young men who procure guns from sources in which the proposed gun insurance laws would dampen.

Remember, the goal of “Lego Legacy Legislation” is not to come up with one perfect law to protect us against one giant problem. Rather, it’s designed to build a better world for the legacy we leave behind, one Lego at a time. Voltair’s words ring true: we mustn’t let perfect be the enemy of good (enough). Sometimes done is better than good because good can always get better. It’s time to get gun insurance laws done. Today!

No one has made smoking illegal by implementing smoking laws. People can still choose to dangle their cancer sticks from their lips if they want to, but now that most clubs are smoke-free, musicians like my husband and vocalists like myself and my daughter, no longer have to worry about getting lung cancer as a result of performing for a living. (Now, we get to worry about Covid instead.) Requiring each gun to be insured if it’s to be used, will not make guns illegal or infringe on the constitutional rights to own a gun, but it will add another layer of protection to preventing mass shootings.

Part Three: Insuring A Gun Solution (Originally appeared in BLUNTMoms on April 18, 2019).

Mothers often excel in areas where politics fail, especially when it comes to conflict resolution. I’ve known more than one mom who could end sibling rivalry with a mere look in the right direction. People are stepping over slain bodies to fight for their right to bear arms. It’s time for a blunt mom to come in, call out, and settle this issue once and for all with an irrefutable gun solution that could end mass shootings and protect the Second Amendment in the process.

Require every gun to be insured by the NRA for wrongful death.

Hear me out: The National Rifle Association already sells gun insurance. They will insure anyone who owns a gun and kills someone in self-defense. For $31.95 per month (2019 price), a gun owner can purchase liability insurance as part of a criminal defense. This insurance also offers civil liability protection with up to a million dollars in reimbursement, except very few gunshot deaths are actually related to self-defense. Why then would the NRA sell insurance for such a thing? Money. If people buy insurance for an event, they think is likely to happen but is actually quite rare, insurance companies profit much more than they pay out.

The NRA has positioned themselves to profit by insuring guns for self-defense. This sets a precedent that the NRA has shown its willingness to offer liability gun insurance. Shouldn’t they also be held accountable to insure guns used for the express purpose of murdering humans?

If the NRA had to be responsible for insuring each gun and had to put a price tag on every life it was insuring, they would pay far more attention to who owns a gun, how many guns they own, and what they use the guns for. More rules would be enforced and set in place to make sure those who bought guns were mentally sound. More regulations would be enforced around monitoring the amount of assault rifles owned by any one person. This could elevate the NRA to what it used to be when it helped to pass some of the earliest safety laws around guns, from supporting a ban on fully automatic weapons to the 1968 Gun Control Act. In a 2021 pollster survey, 74% of NRA members stated that they supported universal background checks. If we had state and federal laws that enforced insurance for guns, it would give those 74% of NRA members an opportunity to put their money where their mouths are.

According to National Vital Statistics Systems, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, and the Center for Disease Control, thousands more deaths occur as a result of guns than cars; and yet we have stricter rules and regulations for owning and operating a vehicle than we do for owning and operating a gun. If we have to insure our cars, why do we not need to insure our guns?

As with car insurance, gun insurance may make gun ownership more cost prohibitive and because of that make gun owners more responsible. Shouldn’t that, which is the cause of so much destruction require legal consideration (license & registration) and safety precautions (required training & insurance)?

In order to drive a car, not only must we have a license and pay registration fees, but we also must pass a written and a physical test to prove we understand the safety mechanisms of driving a car and how to use one. When we break any number of numerous traffic laws, we are ticketed and required to pay a fine, go to traffic school, attend a court hearing, and/or our license can be suspended or taken away. In addition to all those precautions, we also have to insure our vehicle for any damage or death is may cause. Why can we not simply apply the same rules to gun ownership that we do to driving a car?

It’s a no brainer that anyone who has a criminal record, has been accused of domestic violence or child abuse, or has ever threatened to harm themselves or another, should never be allowed to own a gun. A course in gun safety and storage could easily be implemented as part of the purchase process.

This isn’t rocket science; it’s common sense. We can make this happen. We must require, regulate, and enforce that all guns be insured for the human life they have the potential to take. It’s time to put the onus of gun protection onto those who support gun destruction. We can protect the Second Amendment and protect lives simply by requiring all guns to be insured, whether by the NRA, gun manufacturers, or another insurance organization.

Insurance is a profitable industry; it’s a competitive capitalistic commodity: The American Dream. You know what else is an American Dream? Living. Some people want to have the freedom to own a gun, others just want the freedom to live. Mandatory gun insurance protects everyone’s freedoms.

Part Four: Five Steps Each of Us Can Take Today to End Mass Shootings.

When we allow ourselves to really feel the sorrow associated with the fragility of life, we become inspired and emboldened to live life with greater reverence. When we truly revere the life of the person who stands before us, even if we disagree or dislike them, we are neither capable of causing them pain nor allowing them to suffer.

We revere what we value, and we value what we believe has worth.

If we can see every person as someone worthy and in need of care, we can become our highest and best selves — we can self-actualize in that present moment – and the present moment is all we can sustain. Blaming Democrats or Republicans keeps us in a spiral of destruction and devaluing each other as humans. When we choose instead to focus on how in small exchanges, we can offer presence to people who seem to lack the ability to see the sacred in their lives, let alone in the life of others, we demonstrate that we see their worth. Our human worth is not based on who we are but rather that we are. If we exist in this world, we have worth; what we provide to others beyond that—is our value. When we see human worth beyond human value, we are expressing unconditional love. Showing people that we see their worth is just one way we can have a profound impact on preventing their inner hurt to cause outward harm.

When people feel heard, they stop screaming.

No one wants to feel invisible, forgotten, or powerless. Mass shootings are desperate acts of rage, of screaming pain from those who feel discarded and dismissed. The simple, basic human kindness of acknowledging that we see each other, beyond our self-ascribed labels of identity, can begin to transform the world we live in overnight.

Yes, we need better laws and protection; but we have to ask ourselves, “Why do people buy guns in the first place?” It’s often because they are afraid. If we fight fear (buying guns) with fear (protecting with guns), we create more fear. We have two forces at play, and we must choose which we feed: fear or love. We dissolve fear with the security of love. We make people feel protected when we take care of them, and there are many people in the world who do not feel cared for or protected in the world today. This is where our work begins: truly allowing ourselves to see every person we come in contact with, if even for a moment, by offering them our full presence — this is the one action we can all take today. This is where we start the process of healing.

Please know, I hear you saying, “No, I don’t want to think of the shooters. All I care about are the children and victims.” Yes, those who are suffering devastating loss need our attention…and…if we want to prevent the next mass shooting, the next shooter out there needs our attention too.

We must remember that we are connected. When we cut off another, we cut off a part of ourselves; and the world continues to pulse with open wounds. When the ship is sinking, and the ship of America is sinking, we don’t bail the water out before we repair the holes. We form communities and do both concurrently and we survive another day, one step closer to wholeness: integrity. We start the process of healing once we stop the bleed of suffering. We must stop turning a blind eye to those around us who are suffering; and if someone is living in fear, hoarding guns, planning to harm themselves or others, they are indeed suffering. Taking steps to heal those who suffer, is also taking steps toward protecting those who the sufferer may harm as a result of gun violence.

Who in your community is suffering and feeling unseen? What can you do today to help them know their worth in a way that would inspire them to create value instead of destruction? We have the power to evolve beyond these tragedies. Change is the only constant thing in life. That change starts with each of us engaging with the people we tend to ignore. Take the time to make someone feel seen today and watch the change unfurl.

Inspired to Action

It’s our responsibility—each and every one of us—to create new laws. If we want a government for the people, by the people, and of the people, the people need to engage in civic duties beyond voting once every four years.

1. Stand in Our Integrity

How can we say out of one side of our mouths that we want more gun control and out of the other side of our mouths praise films and television with our dollars and time for gun glorifying content? The same advertisers that support entertainment media, support news media, so if they know gun violence gets your attention what do you think they will focus on featuring and what do you think we as a nation, will consciously or subconsciously focus on creating? More gun violence!

We can only demonstrate that we want gun violence to end when we demonstrate that we are not interested in hearing about or seeing it. For only when we turn away from something does it cease to have power over our lives; but as long as we continue to celebrate entertainment that features gun violence, while saying that we’re tired of seeing gun violence in real life, we send the mixed message into the universe of advertisers that gun violence is profitable because whether it appears as entertainment or news, it captures our attention.

It was reported that the Uvalde shooter made eye contact with one of the teachers and said, “Goodnight” before shooting and killing her. These are things people do in movies and video games before killing. We type out “thoughts and prayers” for the victims of gun violence on social media platforms and then return to our video games where we “kill” to relax. Humans are desensitized to violence, from the television and films we watch, to the music lyrics we sing along to, and the video games we play. When are we going to check ourselves and look in the mirror, take radical responsibility for our own contributing ripple effects, and change our behavior?

1. Start your own campaign for gun insurance today.

Go to Lobbyists4good.org. Use your social media platforms and influence to build one Lego Legacy Legislation at a time. If every person who wants to prevent another mass shooting hires a lobbyist to help pass laws in every community, we can and will make a difference. It doesn’t have to be a campaign for gun insurance—it can be any number of efforts to end gun violence. Choose the one you believe in most and feel impassioned by. The most important thing is to take any action toward the goal versus no action at all.

1. Choose to focus where it serves you most.

Have you read these two contrasting statements?

“Gun control doesn’t work—look at Chicago.”

“Gun control does work—look at Australia!”

When we hear statements of contradiction, we can feel immobilized toward effective action. The truth is that any gun law works better than none. Each law builds on the other, like the Legos, until they actually do make a difference and start working in a way that we can perceive. We’ve seen it happen before with the tobacco industry. Different laws address different problems. Take on a law that speaks to you personally and focus on where and how it’s been effective. Don’t let naysayers activate the lazy apathetic gene of inaction. If we want a safer world, we have to do the work to make it so.

1. Protect each other.

People want guns either to feel powerful by harming others or to combat feeling vulnerable because they feel they have been harmed by others.  Many people in American live with housing and job insecurity and do not feel safe or protected. They do not trust the government—in part, because the government isn’t protecting them from guns, inequality in income, health care, education, housing, unions, job security, retirement, and safety in general. Citizens fear a civil war because we collectively spend more time blaming each other for the messes we create than we do working together to clean them up. If we want to ease that fear, we have to stop pointing fingers and choosing sides. We have to protect each other and care about one another as much as we care about ourselves.

1. Stop focusing on how different we think we are from each other.

We walk around so proud of our labeled identities: “liberal, spiritual Democrat” or “conservative, religious Republican.” We spend time choosing sides and picking teams: vegan or paleo, vaxxed or unvaxxed, cis male or trans woman. We’re all human beings sharing the same planet. We all have survival needs and the same desires to love and be loved. Putting so much focus on what makes us different from each other may be causing us more harm than good.

Once I realized how divided we were becoming as a country, I made a conscious choice in conversations and writing to de-emphasize self-identifying ethnically, politically, socially, and religiously, for I realized that each time I identified myself as one thing that aligned me closer with one group, it also meant I cut myself off from something else; and as citizens of the world, we are too cut off from our common humanity.

Underneath all the identities that highlight our individuality, our race, our R.A.C.E. (Religions, Allegiances/Nationalities, Cultural Identities, and Ethnicities) is the one thing we all are: human beings. When we can stop focusing so much on what makes us different, and separate from one another, we can come together as one.

The nature of the entertainment industry is branding, to become some “thing” which is identifiable with you. With the aid of viral videos, we are literally living in Warhol’s prescient world where everyone has the chance for 15 minutes of fame. Many people are searching for that as a form of validation for their relevance and human worth. They believe the more they can be different, the likelier they will stand out and be noticed and as such, feel value and to some extent, survive. (Make a living.) In contrast, the nature of oneness is to release everything we come to attach an identity to that distances us from humanity as a whole. The older I become, the more I desire to be less of who I am that separates my humanity from anyone else’s. This need to be seen as special or unique is dividing us. When we can focus on all our commonalities, we can and will find unity and truly know the meaning of acting on behalf of the “greater good.”

Closing Thoughts

The publication, In These Times, notes that “the United States is home to the largest weapons industry in the world, with all top five global weapons companies based in the country.” Academic author and activist Khury Petersen-Smith is quoted as saying, “The US manufactures and sells more weapons than any other country. It invests in developing the most lethal weapons in the world, in using them to arm its military, its police, and its allies, and makes those weapons extremely available to its own population. Some of America’s largest gun and ammunition makers have seen their stock prices swell since the last massacre.”

According to Robert Reich, “51 members of congress and their spouses own up to 5.8 million in defense contractor stocks.”

Whether it’s the opioid crisis or gun violence, government intervention seems to start at the level of the individual rather than the corporations. It’s easier to take freedom from the plebeians than to take freedom from the pharmaceutical and gun manufactures who line the pockets of politicians on both sides of the political isle. How and why are we to trust a government in which the very same people who profit from a rise in products related to guns and drugs are also making the laws around guns and drugs? If we as a country are promoting and profiting from gun violence in the stock market and media, is there not a conflict of interest to end that gun violence in our schools? How do we isolate foreign gun violence (the sell of lethal aid weapons) from domestic gun violence (the sell of automatic riffles to the general public) when the same manufactures, lobbyists, and stockholders profit from both?

When presidents of the United States, regardless of political affiliation, say they want to end gun violence but continue to pander to a legislative branch of a government that accepts money from gun lobbyists, maintains foreign contracts for weapons, and whose members of congress profit from gun manufacturing stock—the words come across as mere performative gestures.

President Joe Biden has asked lawmakers to reinstate the expired 1994 ban on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines. Why ask and not tell? In my household, we believe in freedom and have never enforced discipline or punishment because we believe natural consequences to be the best teacher in life. That being said, there comes a time in regard to safety, when as a parent (or even spouse or child) one must say, “This is a requirement, not a request.” It’s not to wield power and control over another, it’s to use power to control a situation for the greater good of all concerned. What’s the point of having a governing body if it’s incapable of governing? Where does the buck stop, if not with the president of the United States?

The three branches of government: judicial, legislative, and executive each may run in theory as a democracy; but without a leader to take the helm, the ship spins in circles. If our country surrenders to bureaucracy, who does that leave in control of all the power? I realize that the executive branch was put in place to determine how laws are executed, not to create legislation; but in practice, laws are often created under presidential influence. What’s the point of an executive branch that can’t make an executive decision?

As a nation, we have lost our way through a tangled web of governmental bureaucracy, resulting in a lack of leadership. Have you ever been in a car with someone driving who didn’t know where they were going? Or hiking with a group of people where the one leading the troop had clearly lost their way? Did you keep following, with fingers crossed behind your back, holding onto faith, trust, and pixie dust that they will find their way? Or did you call for a time-out and look at the map yourself and start leading the pack?

The first time a governmental bureaucracy leads us astray, we forgive it as part of the imperfect process of humanity. The second time a governmental bureaucracy leads us astray, it’s a pattern that needs to be addressed. The third time a governmental bureaucracy leads us astray, we are an accomplice to our own demise.

When are we going to step up and demand change?

We oppose mass shootings, while we accept being conditioned as Americans to embrace violence like this from other actions—like those our country takes against foreign lands in drone bombings that also kill innocent people. History teaches us that until the people who make laws are directly impacted by those laws, nothing really changes. Who in your life personally has to die before you will take some quantifiable action to end gun violence today? We are all responsible for the tragic deaths associated with gun violence; for what we oppose with our left hand, we elevate with our right.

If you read this article and it motivates and inspires you to take action, please reach out and share with me what you’re doing. I will consider you a hero and memorialize you in any way that I can. Thank you for reading, and more importantly, thank you for taking action.

For more resources, please visit

Every Town For Gun Safety (everytown.org)

www.91percentfilm.com/organizations

Sage Justice is achingly sincere. Balancing wisdom and humor she most often writes deeply personal solution based pieces about the enduring virtues that connect us all: love and healing. She is an award-winning playwright and critically acclaimed performing artist who has appeared on stages from Madison Square Garden in New York City, to The Comedy Store in Hollywood, California. Ms. Justice is the author of Sage Words FREEDOM Book One, an activist, a member of the Screen Actors Guild and an alumna Artist-In-Residence of Chateau Orquevaux, France. She is a co-founder of The Unity Project which fuses activism with art, to educate and inspire, with a special emphasis on community engagement to end homelessness. She has a series of short reels about living with the rare genetic disorder, Vascular Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome that you can find in a highlight reel on her Instagram page @SageWords2027.